Annales de la Societe belge de medecine tropicale最新文献

Between January 1985 and March 1986, in the high altitude area of Kivu, Eastern Zaïre, 38 patients presenting with hemoglobinuria as main manifestation were investigated. Profound glucose-6-phosphate dehydrogenase deficiency was detected in 4 patients, leptospirosis in 2 and Hantaan virus infection in 2. Hemolysis was doubtful (haptoglobin > 40 mg/dl, Hemoglobin > 12 g/dl) in 2 patients. Other potential causes of hemoglobinuria such as hemoglobinopathy, toxic agents, infectious diseases or blood transfusion incompatibility were carefully screened and excluded. The syndrome observed in the remaining 28 cases was strongly suggestive of blackwater fever (BWF) as described in malaria patients by several authors under the french name "fièvre bilieuse hémoglobinurique". Quinine was used as curative treatment of malaria before admission in a significant greater proportion (p < 0.01) of patients with BWF compared to patients with uncomplicated malaria, suggesting that this drug might have played a triggering role in the genesis of BWF. However, quinine was usually administered at inadequate doses to malaria patients non responding to chloroquine and belonging to a population of whom 50% are non immune. It may thus also be hypothesized that BWF in our patients could result from a hyperparasitemic state that remained undetected because of an unusual synchronous lysis of infected erythrocytes. In the latter case BWF would correspond to a major complication of falciparum malaria only coincidentally related to the use of quinine.

Parasitological data of various malarial studies performed in the Congo where Plasmodium falciparum malaria is holo-endemic in rural and suburban zones, between 1988 and 1991, were analyzed with the intention of establishing diagnosis and prognosis value of Plasmodium falciparum parasitaemia in areas with high perennial transmission. In such an area congolese school-children (6-10 years old) had 88% P. falciparum index, this is the same percentage as that for children hospitalized with a pernicious attack. However, the parasite load is distributed differently; parasitaemia is greater than 6,000 asexual form of P. falciparum/microliters (afPf/microL) in only 4.6% of cases in the former group versus 67% in the second group. A threshold of 10,000 afPf/microliters, above which the Plasmodium infection triggers a febrile attack in semi-immune children, is confirmed in school children in a rural context where the factor of taking antimalarial drugs within the preceding days is negligible; three out of four children with levels above this threshold are febrile versus 4.1% (7 out of 170) with lower blood parasite levels. Some adults were also asymptomatic carriers but much less frequently and with lower mean parasitaemia levels. The parasite load mirrors the clinical severity although this concept can be misleading as an individual prognostic criterion and for hospital studies carried out in areas where multiple drug administration before hospitalisation is common. For the studies recently performed in Brazzaville, the 5% threshold level of parasitized red cells, the WHO severity criterion, was never reached in asymptomatic subject or in cases of simple attack; it was reached in one out of two cases of pernicious attack.

The protocols for treatment of human African trypanosomiasis (sleeping sickness) with the organoarsenical drug melarsoprol are based on empirical observations. Therapy is often accompanied by serious side effects and relapses. Additionally, the duration of treatment, which is up to forty days, is a major drawback in African countries. Based on pharmacokinetic investigations an alternative therapy protocol for T. gambiense sleeping sickness has recently been proposed which consists of ten consecutive injections of 2.2 mg/kg melarsoprol given at intervals of 24 hours. In a preliminary study, eleven patients were treated in Vanga, Zaire following this alternative protocol which reduces the duration of the treatment to ten days. The results indicate that the alternative schedule was as effective as the traditional protocol, showed similar adverse reactions but required a much shorter treatment period.

The word ¿general practice¿ denotes different contents of work as we look at different contexts. General practitioners may provide first line care, function as secondary care providers at hospital level, take responsibility for the management of health care systems. These different roles can be seen as results from historical processes of division of work in the field of health care, which gave general practice its present shapes. During the first half of the 20th century, western general practitioners were gradually excluded from hospitals as well as from public health activities. When they started to react in order to increase their legitimacy they strived--with variable success--to gain recognition as curative first line care providers, as this had become the only place in the health care system they could claim for. They gradually defined their specificity in terms of polyvalence enabling them to deal with unselected problems, and in terms of global view allowing for adequate priority setting. In developing countries, the organisation of medical care was and remains influenced by western models. As in western countries, emphasis has been put on specialisation and hospital technology. General practice was not exported to developing countries: general practitioners appear rather as cheap substitutes for specialists. The most typical workplace for general practitioners in developing countries remains the rural hospital. But their role model refers to the hospital based specialist: they tend to focus on patient care for hospital users rather than on dynamising health care delivery to the whole community in the district. In urban areas, the recent expansion of (mostly private) first line medical care is also not specific to general practice and tends to be in favour of specialists. What is the common denominator to these different roles, if any? A possible answer lies in the primary health care approach. It allows to define the specificity of general practitioners in terms of multifactorial approach and global view on health and illness, which differentiates them from specialists. Whether they provide this care themselves or organise it at district level could be less important to their professional identity than the general attitudes and knowledge they rely on.

Together with economic causes, the declining belief in the relevance of clinical skills, the omission of the hospital from the health system, and the erroneous generalisation of a complaint centred approach enhanced the decline in clinical medicine in several developing countries over the last decades. Despite a growing interest and important efforts in continuous education, basic training remains generally knowledge-directed. Clinical training should start from a realistic job description, and aim at acquiring skills instead of knowledge. Basics of clinical epidemiology can help refine clinical logic both at the health centre and the hospital level. the district hospital should be awarded a key role in pre-graduate and continuous clinical training. Awaiting a revival of the economy in most tropical countries, and especially in tropical Africa, an effective way for improving clinical practice is to invest in training, at all levels, with an emphasis on continuous medical training.